Going Nowhere, To Eternity
by Andriech
Summary: Pavel Chekov's eighth Name Day may not be the celebration he expects, if some government leaders have anything to do with it. Please R&R!


**__**

Going Nowhere,

To Eternity...

He darted in and out of the throngs of people, his black leather shoes kicking up dust as he ran. Summer had finally settled on the remote Russian village so at least the spring onslaught of mud was gone.

"Congratulations, Pavel Andrievich!"

He turned and waved a hand back at the older woman who had leaned over her table of fresh eggs to call after him. He shouted back the expected reply. He was sure she could not hear it over the bustle of the crowd, but it didn't matter: Russian was a language filled with pre-designed conversations. The woman knew what he said without hearing him.

He shifted the weight of the canvas bag slung around his shoulder as he ran and knew that no outsider would see what he so clearly did. The daily exchange of wares was simply a ruse today. The village center was filled less with those actually buying and selling and more with those who had come here for what was most vital to them: their connection with each other.

A mad energy gripped the 18th century villagers in the midst of the sparkling day. Time swept past in minutes and hours, blindly unknowing of the little effect it had over the centuries. The party he would host at his home that night filled the day with its presence and held all other reality captive. The community that helped raise him was focused on nothing else.

Pursuing footsteps echoed as he ran and he took mad delight in eluding them. At very height of the wild game of chase, however, he saw his father's glare of disapproval from where he leaned against his automobile.

Chastised by the mere look, Pavel allowed himself to be devoured by his pursuers. He came up sputtering from the wild press of small bodies, giggling and flinging candy from the bag he carried high into the air. They scattered to retrieve the candy in a mad scramble.

For time immortal, these people had endured without change: surviving the onslaught of conquerors and governments alike with no more reaction than one had to the wind. They cherished the values and culture of their forefathers as a means of preservation. They had fought for the right to do so. Historic Districts now formally capsuled their way of life within the outer world of the 23rd century. For the children, however, it meant the luxury of processed candy was something nearly unheard of. Showering them with it on his Name Day had seemed like a natural choice to him.

Pavel moved easily between the two unique worlds modern Russia presented because of his family's travels. It was the Traditional Russian celebration of one's Name Day, however, that had provided him with his first memorable lesson in cultural anthropology. Elsewhere, birthdays were celebrated with friends and relatives lavishing the recipient with gifts and parties. His own 8th birthday was not until August 4th, but today was July 29th--the feast of St. Pavel on the Orthodox calendar. It was his Name Day and the difference was not a subtle one. He was expected to host the party: to invite others to celebrate both life's blessings and his saint's patronage.

The focus on the individual during birthday celebrations was emotionally baffling to him, for whom the community was merely an extension of himself. The stark contrast had made him understand that he may rationally join their world someday, but this is where his soul would always belong.

The bag empty now, he smacked the dust off his white pants and silk stockings as he ran to the car. "Just one inning?" he entreated as he climbed into the car.

"Baseball or the party, not time for both today," his father replied, latching the door and moving around to slip into the driver's seat. Eyeing the boy mischievously, the elder man started the car and moved them toward home. "The President wants to speak to you. Besides, I'm sure the coach will welcome the batting practice."

Pavel ducked his head and smiled sheepishly. "The point of pitching is not to let the batter hit the ball."

"Yes," the man drawled in agreement. "But I imagine that's for more exciting in _Moscow Dragons'_ or _New York Yankees'_ games than in Little League ones."

The child giggled aloud. A complete peasant at heart, his father truly did not understand competitive sports and took others at their word that his son showed promise in both baseball and European football. That he tortured himself by cheerfully appearing at the games which so baffled him was a testament to the loyalty he had for his son.

Sports, of course, were not something that one would have routinely found in an 18th century Russian village. That was where these people, who actually lived in the past, had privileges historic tourist towns filled with actors did not.

A charter had established the National Russian Historic Districts 10 years ago to guarantee these people's way of life and provide both 23rd century medical care and education. Finally secure that their values and culture would continue, loopholes had been left to allow something of the modern world to creep through when determined benign. Thus appeared in the villages competitive sports, occasional candy, and the automobile that his father liked to take apart and reassemble seemingly without reason.

Pavel was not too young to have heard, and understood, what people in the outside world said about his father. This Navy officer, whose spotless white uniform was covered with medals and braids of gold, was an enigma they could not possibly understand. They said the villagers thought him a god.

Pavel was also not too young to understand that this was not true. He had seen the way the villagers looked at his father: the way they treated him when he walked among them. The people saw him as man not born or raised among them, but who was so much one of them that he symbolized them to the outside world. They saw the man who had stood between them and that world's forces when peasants were declared an embarrassment to a 23rd century government.

The people of the Historic Districts respected the self-effacing man they had made their Combined Council President as a man of clear-cut, unwavering principles and disarming, direct honesty. The outside world's respect was more generally expressed as fear. Though they didn't know it, the fear was reciprocated. His father didn't know how to deal with their veiled diplomatic games, except with the honesty that, more often than not, got him into trouble.

"Why is the President of Russia here?" Pavel asked as the car pulled to a halt in front of the marble palace that acted as their home. "The party doesn't start for hours."

"He wants to talk to you, I'm told," his father responded as he relinquished the driver's seat to one of the seaman serving on his flagship. They, too, called this their home when the ship was in port. He could read nothing more from his father's averted eyes, but the two seamen that hopped onto the passenger side running board were grinning wildly at him.

"What is it?" he asked, his eyes narrowing suspiciously.

"Just looking forward to the party," one of them answered easily, the lie shining so brilliantly in his eyes even the child could see it. Pavel stared after them as the car moved away toward one of the carriage houses. There, the seamen would erase all traces of use from the antique.

"_Malyenki_."

Starting at the sternness of the voice, Pavel was relieved when he turned to find the smoky depths of his father's eyes directed at the diminishing forms of the seamen. For whatever reason they were smiling, his father was not happy.

The man affectionately brushed his slender fingers down the back of the child's hair, straightening his sailor hat and short braid as they entered the ornate home. "Entertain yourself while I speak to him first," he said as they reached the top of the stairs and turned into the long corridor down the west wing.

The child sought out his father's hand, seeking some sort of stability in the midst of the man's strange behavior. He gripped it tight suddenly, horror giving flight to any other concerns as his eyes took in the flowing expanse of marble floor before them: its wax coat clearly not more than hour's old. The long marble corridor, a fresh coat of wax and his slippery leather shoes were not something the 28-year-old Commander in Chief of the New Imperial Russian Navy, President of the Combined Council of the National Russian Historic Districts, could ever bring himself to resist: despite the best efforts of his wife and those charged with maintaining the shine.

Pavel gripped the hand harder, setting his body to resist the forward motion he normally relished. He knew how his mother would react to the sight of his father sailing down the corridor with the President of the country watching.

"Papa . . . "

"Go," his father said with uncharacteristic distance as he released his hand. The man straightened his uniform, locked his hands behind his back, and plodded off down the hall.

Pavel stared after him. He suddenly, ominously, wondered what he could possibly have done to warrant his father's strange behavior and the President's visit on this, of all days. He retreated quietly to the place he had always gone for solace: the place his father knew he would be.

"Now, when they told me those books would help you in your celestial observations, that's not quite what I pictured," his father mused when he appeared there later.

Pavel looked up from the telescope's eyepiece to see the man's eyes, nearly as black as his hair, shining warmly. The boy's dark eyes were a mirror of his father's and they reflected the amusement as well. He shifted his weight on the stack of books. "They serve a variety of functions, Papa. Besides," he added, "Jupiter is up already. I don't need Burnham's Celestial Handbook to locate that."

"Ah," the elder man acknowledged, then fell silent again. The boy didn't turn back to the telescope, as his father's eyes remained frozen on him. He had the lonely sensation of suddenly being a stranger.

His father drew a tremulous breath finally, as though it were painful to do. "The President is ready," he stated quietly. "He's brought some friends as well. Would it be all right if they spoke to you too, _Malyenki?_"

The boy hopped off the stack of books, chewing on his lip thoughtfully. That it was more than his "Uncle Viktor" here was disturbing, a fact his father had noticeably tried to lessen with the use of his nickname.

"I suppose it's all-right," he shrugged after a moment. "But you said you would never lie to me."

The man's eyes went suddenly empty. "I didn't know . . . "

"How can you stand there," the boy interrupted, "and actually claim the President has friends?!"

He was bolting through the balcony doors before the final words were uttered. He heard his father's ever graceful footsteps behind him as he pelted down the hall, giggling in utter delight. He would have eluded capture, too, if he had not slowed when he saw his mother's form exit the room into his path.

It was enough of a hesitation for his father to scoop him high into the air and spin in circles as they both roared with laughter.

"Boys!"

Gulping down their glee, his father quickly dropped him to the ground. Instantly, and simultaneously, both males straightened their uniforms.

The woman in their lives stood glaring at them, her subhuman silence deafening. Her green eyes were so brilliant with fury, they were nearly gemstones. Their color and her fine beauty merely transfixed the child and took his breath away at moments like this. He understood it was not the effect she looking to impart, but she had grown accustomed to it from his father. The elder man giggled at her at this point in time.

She glared at him pointedly as she reseated Pavel's hat on his head. "They're waiting for you. I've served tea. _Please_, for the love of Mother Russia, behave yourself!" The admonition was to her husband, on whom she had given up all hope long ago. Her son she had faith in.

"Come, _Malyenki_." His father opened the door into the library, where he saw a variety of visitors already occupying the scattering of antique furniture. He recognized not only the President of the Russian Federation, but its Cultural Minister as well. Also in the room were the President of the Federation of Planets, the Commander in Chief of Starfleet and a middle-aged woman his father introduced as a Doctor.

It was a strange group, he thought, as he settled next to his father on a sofa and spooned black currant jelly into the _podstakanniki_ full of black tea before him. His eyes were transfixed in morbid curiosity as the Starfleet Admiral ladled spoonfuls of sugar into his tea. Although refined sugar was a luxury in the Historic Districts, it was not so rare he was not accustomed to seeing it. What he was not accustomed to was seeing it being dissolved into tea.

"I heard you're a Yankee's fan," the Federation President was saying, leaning forward with bright gray eyes to offer him a baseball hat with the team's emblem on it. He accepted the hat and fixed his brown eyes on it hesitatingly. He still didn't know why they were here. Was this some type of perverse test of ethnic loyalty? Who would question a Traditional Russian--the people for whom the word _Rhodina_ still meant their soul?

"I'd like to see them play the Dragons," he answered honestly, meeting the man's gaze. "Thank-you for the hat," he said louder to cover his father's sputtering of tea back into the glass. The elder man had often expressed envy at his son's innate ability to tell the truth without offending anyone. His mother called it diplomacy. Pavel called it staying out of trouble as long as humanly possible.

"Pavel," the woman asked in a merry, singsong voice. "Do you have many friends?" She leaned forward so that he could better see the maniacal look in her muted blue eyes.

He turned his eyes to his father in wild desperation. "Why is she talking to me like I have the brain of a house pet? What kind of question is that: who doesn't have friends?"

"Pasha." It was the Russian President this time, his voice trying to soothe him. Pavel recognized a validation of his concern over the woman's attitude, however.

"What grade level are you in?"

If this further question was meant to relax him, it did not. It merely perplexed him more. The heat from his tea had made it through both the glass and its metal holder, and his palms were burning as he stared at the man. His insides were as numb as his hands. What had Pavel done to bring all these people here? His 'Uncle Viktor' knew that Pavel didn't know the answer to his question.

"I don't go to school. My mother and other tutors teach me because we travel so much. I am ahead of grade level," he added.

He saw a blink of surprise from his father. He knew they didn't want him to know. Pavel had such an appetite for learning, they fed it as quickly as they could and tried to avoid the artificial goals they felt might douse his eagerness. He couldn't help noticing he'd long since completed the courses his friends in more traditional schools were studying, however.

"I'm told you're going to compete in the European Pianist Tournament."

"I'm told that as well." His knuckles were white as he felt the group exchange a quick glance.

"You don't want to?" the Doctor asked with a meaningful expression. What it meant, he didn't know.

He shrugged. "My teacher says it will be good for my development. My mother says it will be good for our people. I'm only seven: how would I know better?"

"But you don't like the idea," the Doctor concluded in a triumphant manner that annoyed him.

"It won't hurt," he said staring into his tea a long moment. He was wishing it was burning his hands still as his insides were ice cold. "I think it's stupid," he finally added without raising his eyes. "Was Beethoven better than Chopin? Bach better than Rachmaninoff? How could you choose to award one a prize?"

He felt the smiles of soft pride on the Russian's faces and raised his eyes to the government leaders seated across from him. He already understood--that as his father's son--he was the 'poster child' for the first generation of Russians with traditional values and 23rd century education. These two men were sometimes overzealous in their ownership of him, but at least their reaction gave him a small relief that he must have passed some part of the test.

"You like music," the Minister of Culture beamed, not even seeming to need an answer to the question.

"I'm good at math," the child said in an understatement that made his father wince in amusement. "Music, astronomy...it's all math."

"How much work do you do when the crew of the _Nelzya_ is sailing?" the Admiral from Starfleet suddenly asked, blurting the question out in almost an accusatory manner. Pavel saw his hazel eyes pierce the surrounding company as he locked his arms across his chest.

The boy straightened, placing his _podstakanniki_ down. "Whatever I'm able, and allowed," he responded sedately. "I'm too small for many things, but I can holystone, haul, sew, paint, tar, pay seams..."

The man stared at him pointedly a long moment, as if he already knew that Pavel was guilty of the sins they were here to expose.

"I heard you go aloft."

"Only to the fighting top," he answered quickly. Too quickly? he wondered. Had he broken that rule lately...in sight of anyone who would reveal it?

"Why not higher?" Again, it was almost an accusation.

"It makes my mother faint," he said simply.

An instantaneous chuckle ran through the group. He found it relieved him enormously, but Pavel wished his father were demanding this group be as direct with the son as they would have been with the father. He turned wide, brown eyes on the man at his side and happened to catch him gazing at his son. It was the first time all day Pavel had a chance to see his eyes.

Swaddled in infancy, Traditional Russians learned to communicate almost entirely through their eyes. The child's insides seized as he realized that, although Pavel was being questioned, it was his father facing the group's onslaught. Why?

"How much of your day is spent working?"

He didn't like what he perceived to be a bitter woman. "As much as needed," he retorted, no longer trusting the motives of anyone who would attack his father so indirectly. "I do my lessons and play but when everyone's needed, I do what I'm able."

"When there's nothing to do, you're at your leisure, though?"

He laughed out loud, his dark eyes sparkling. His father would have been laughing too, only he had the misfortune of having a mouthful of tea when the statement was made.

"You don't know much about traditional sailing ships, do you?" he asked the Federation President. "There's always something that has to be done."

"Pavel Andrievich is quite a seaman already," the Russian President observed with pride.

Pavel felt his father stiffen beside him.

"You like it, though, Pavel?"

The boy turned his eyes to the Starfleet Admiral. He liked this man, whose straightforward questions and direct gaze reminded him of his father.

"Yes, Sir."

"You spend a great deal of time with the sailors...seamen?" he continued.

Pavel wondered who had corrected his use of the landsman's term earlier. "Yes. They're my brothers," he added, far too proud too admit that for a time, he had actually thought they were his brothers--so like a family were they.

The Starfleet Admiral stared at him, unblinking, for a long moment. Leaning forward with movement of resignation, he placed his _podstakanniki_ on the table before him. "This is fruitless and a waste of time," he announced as he stood in an obvious act of dismissal. "We know our answers already. To suggest that this young man is anything but charmingly well balanced is ridiculous. As for the rest..."

His hazel eyes pierced through the other members of the group as they stood. "The laws are clear and my report will say so if I'm forced to make one. That will be determined by your actions, of course, Mr. President," he added, nodding to the Federation official.

The man returned the nod. "I don't think any of us feel further discussion is necessary. The seamen were quite right to bring this matter up. Mr. President," he addressed the country's leader, "the Articles of the Navy must be amended and action--one way or the other--must be documented to the Federation Council by the 4th," he hesitated, glancing at Pavel, "on the other matter."

Pavel stared up at the visitors as they made their gestures of farewell: feeling both perplexed and alone although each one made a special effort to speak to him as they exited.

"Papa," he entreated, turning his expressive eyes up to him when they were left alone with the Russian President. His 'Uncle Viktor' began laughing: a maniacal triumphant sound that filled the room.

"He's my son, not my employee!" his father roared in response, turning so quickly Pavel thought he might actually strike the other man.

"He's both now," the President smiled simplistically.

"What does he mean?" Pavel jerked his head from his father to the President and back again.

"Well," the President answered, sitting down on the table before the child to better meet his gaze. "First, your father has to make some of the Navy's rules more specific. Second," his 'Uncle' smiled, "You need to decide if you want to continue wearing that uniform and sailing with your parents."

"What?" Pavel asked incredulously. He'd been wearing the uniform since he was two. It was cooler, warmer--and offered the best protection against the salt air, the sea water, the tar, the paint, the ropes... Everyone around him wore the uniform.

"Not be with my parents?" he demanded hotly.

"You know maritime history, Pasha. Boys were hired to work on ships at what age?"

Pavel scowled. Teaching maritime history was one of the Navy's primary functions. To imply that he hadn't learned it....

"Cabin boys were hired as young as eight," he retorted impudently. "I..." He stopped, eyes flying wide as the President laughed.

"Papa!" he exclaimed.

The man's eyes were shining brilliantly with humble humor at his own resounding defeat.

"You need to sign the Nelzya's ship muster before the 4th, Pasha," the President was saying as he stood. "You'll be an official member of the navy then, with a salary and all." The man winked at him as he left the room. "We have to invest in our future, young man."

Pavel stared at the door the man closed behind him uneasily. As if drawn, he turned slowly to gaze at the framed print leaning against the wall.

"Can we hang my present now, Papa?" he asked, his voice sounding distant.

He didn't even listen to the answer. He knew it. The house was by all rights a museum: one didn't just go attaching things to the walls. There were procedures to be followed.

"I want it across from my bed." His eyes were transfixed by the image of the moon, of the stars ... of the cosmonaut suspended in their midst. "Papa," he asked finally. "Uncle Viktor thinks I'm going to take over your job, doesn't he?"

He felt his father's hands slip quietly onto his shoulders from behind.

"Yes," he spoke into the silence. "I think he does."

"Why?"

The elder man sighed. "Oh, I think that because children are the way we perpetuate the species, parents often confuse that with perpetuating themselves: as though children are replacements, not people themselves."

People like his grandparents, Pavel thought. He used the better part of valor and didn't voice the thought.

"He'll be upset with me when the time comes."

"He won't be President when the time comes," his father dismissed the worry. The voice he heard in his dreams at night continued on. "If you're going to live your life on your own terms, you're going to have to get used to people being upset with you."

Something else his grandparents had reinforced, if not taught the man.

"I think you were born knowing that, _Malyenki_."

Pavel turned his head and looked up at his father with wide, innocent eyes. It was possible that his fits of stubbornness, temper tantrums, and the hunger strike that had won him the right to wear the uniform in the first place didn't occur to the boy, after all.

His father's eyes sparkled conspiratorially. Pavel's nickname "Little One" did not refer to either his size or the translation of his name. Who better than the "Big One" in the family to understand? Pavel reminded himself daily to be grateful it was a polite euphemism the seamen had settled on for the family's most routine pet name for him.

He turned back to stare at the starfield in the print. Pavel's mind had already done the calculations to know the constellations were portrayed accurately from this vantage point: positioned with near perfection. The silence took command again before Pavel could bear to voice his thoughts.

"Are you upset with me, Papa?"

He could feel the man's laughter shaking his body, rather than here it. "_Malyenki_, your first word was star. Even as an infant, the only thing that would soothe you was the stars."

"We spent many nights out under them together," Pavel concluded the statement he'd heard countless times before. It was how he'd learned the constellations before he'd known any alphabet.

The man leaned over and touched his face to the top of the boy's hat, chuckling. "The dream was clear in your eyes before you ever learned to speak. You never hid it. Who else would name a dog 'Galaxy'?"

"Don't you have a dream for me?"

His father's hands tightened on him and there was a strange silence. "My dream is to see you reach yours," he whispered after a moment, a catch in the usually eloquent voice.

"Too many parents think it is safer to impose their own," he added after another silence. "I don't even have control of my own life and dreams: how could I manage yours?"

Pavel moved forward then and dropped to his knees in front of the print, reaching his hand out toward it as though he could touch the capsule and the man tethered to it

The fighting top was also farther than his mother wanted to see him go yet. What he'd confided to his father, though, made the man wipe away any objections from his wife.

"Papa, I play Leonov. Please don't take it away..."

Lying flat on his back on the platform, arms and legs swaying with the motion of the ship: only there in the midair of the depthless night sky could he feel the exuberance of being truly lost among the stars. It was dismal enough that he was robbed of it while they were on land.

His father knelt beside him and drew a slow finger along the words that Leonov, himself, had written on the print of man's first walk in space.

"I was going nowhere, to eternity..."

Father and son both knew where the boy's dreams were taking him.

"Come, _Malyenki_, I want to give you your present from me."

Pavel blinked, and pointed at the autographed print of Leonov's painting of his walk.

"What about..."

Standing, his father shook his head. "This is from me."

The boy climbed to his feet, understanding what his father did not say. Perhaps it was the time they had spent beneath the stars together, perhaps it was their shared dark eyes: something had bound their souls together in an indelible way which no one could touch.

His mother claimed to have the answer. "You're star travelers, Little One. The stars may be leading you in different directions, but the stars are what guide you both."

At seven, he was certainly not going to claim to know better.

Pavel gazed up at the stars through the cherry tree branches as his father guided the horse through the orchard. Clouds were occasionally wafting by, obscuring his view of the night sky. It was irritating, but it could have been worse.

Morosely, he was also aware of how alone they were. "Why doesn't she come, Papa?" he asked plaintively. "I've been looking."

His father smiled in the way of one that had special insight to the universe's founder. "For almost eight years? Men have looked for far longer with no luck."

He could feel his father duck his head and eye the branches. "You'll be far more likely to hear her song."

"No one has seen or heard her since Tsar Ivan. I think she's dead," the child announced.

His father jerked abruptly. "Dead?" he gasped. "_Zharpesta_ dead?" He said it with wonder, as though he needed to hear the concept voiced to believe anyone could have proposed it.

"I haven't seen my parents in eons, but I hardly qualify that as proof their dead, _Malyenki._ Don't you see her work around you?"

His father was an expert in fairy tales,

particularly Russian ones, so of course Pavel knew the story of the Firebird. It was the one story he requested each and every night. The brilliant red bird had flown over Russia, dropping feathers and spreading beauty across the land. He didn't know many males that hadn't searched for her at some point in their life.

"Russia is the most beautiful land on Earth," he admitted sheepishly. "But she did that long ago."

"You think it just stayed that way without her help?" his father asked, admittedly amused. The boy felt him slide off the saddle and turned to find him reaching up. He climbed down into his father's arms.

"Then why does she hide?" he asked as his father set him on the ground.

A sadness came into the man's eyes as he took his son's hand. "This world is not safe for her anymore, _Malyenki_," he said quietly as they began walking. "She's responsible for all the beauty in the world, not only the physical beauty. There are too few believers left for her to show herself."

"What other kind of beauty?"

The boy saw a haunting, deathlike pain penetrate the bottomless depths of his father's dark eyes. "Oh," the man sighed in a faint, tremulous voice. "The beauty only the Earth knows: leprechaun, fairies, unicorns, mermaids, banyas, Father Christmas and the Snow Maiden. There aren't enough..." his voice drifted off and he stopped, staring into the night sky.

Pavel had seen that pain in his father's eyes before. When he told the stories, there was a life in his eyes that drew people to him. It was different when he opened the Navy's shows, however. When the man explained how the stories were being lost, dissipating into nothingness like fairies that fell down dead at disbelief, the pain in his dark eyes was almost too much to bear.

The child waited for his father to sit and settle his back against a cherry tree before he nestled in between his legs.

"Papa," he asked, suddenly seized by the horror that he would forget after they were apart. "You wrote about _Zharpesta_, didn't you?"

"Yes, _Malyenki_," he answered. He had made it his life's work--the Navy's--to collect and teach the disappearing stories and songs of Earth's culture. "That's not going to matter, though. Paper is colorless, computer disks cold."

He laid his palm on his son's chest, leaning forward so the warmth of his cheek touched the boy's. "If they aren't alive in here, they are dead."

The boy gripped his father's hand with both of his, feeling suddenly inadequate. "But, how do I know..."

A soft chuckle from deep in the man's throat interrupted him. "Oh, I know, Pavel Andrievich. I know. Look up there," he said, pointing at the stars. "What do you see?

"I'll tell you," he continued without pausing for an answer. "Other men see fuel possibilities, mineral deposits. You see dreams, Pavel. When you look at the stars you see dreams.

"I'm glad you're not the only one, _Malyenki_. Peter Pan is not dead yet." His father wrapped both arms around him tightly. "But there are too few of you left."

Sighing, the man reached behind Pavel and into his coat. "Dreams are what make our world beautiful and life worth living. _Rhodina_ and _Zharpesta_ gave birth to dreams. Here."

Turning, Pavel held out his hand to accept the thin black lacquer locket and gold chain his father let snake into his outstretched palm. He turned it over, letting the moonlight illuminate its surface.

"St. Nikolai," he said, identifying the icon on it.

"Patron Saint of star travelers: safety, Pavel."

"And dreams," the boy smiled, seeing the Firebird emblazoned on the other side.

"Inside:_ Rhodina_," his father added quietly. "So you will never be without them no matter where your dreams take you."

__

Rhodina, Pavel mused as he slipped the chain around his neck. Without checking, he knew there was black Russian soil inside: it was the tradition of Russian emigres to take it with them.

The man squeezed him tight again. "Look," he instructed, pointing forward into the night sky. "This is my present."

There, spread out before them like an alive, pulsating map, was the city. The sight was beautiful and Pavel smiled. He didn't say he preferred his sleepy village's bonfire or that the city lights made this an extremely poor vista for stargazing.

"Papa--"

"Shh: learn patience, Little One."

"Papa--"

"Watch."

Suddenly, the universe seized up within Pavel, the whole of it going supernova within the confines of his body. A streak of light arose majestically from within the depths of the city. His eyes followed it as it rose ever higher, until it disappeared into the star filled heavens: taking a piece of his soul with it.

"Papa!" he gasped in delight as he waited for the next routine flight. He had forgotten about the city's spaceport and certainly had no idea there was anywhere nearby from which to watch it's departures.

His father grasped him ferociously. "I swear," he whispered the oath to his son. "I'll never let them take your dreams away. Never, Pavel Andrievich."

"Pavel!"

He started, fingers still grasping the locket beneath his uniform shirt, and surveyed the group of officer's staring at him silently. My, he thought sedately. The mindless task of star mapping certainly did produce the most inane of rec room diversions.

"Everyone else is done, Pavel," the Captain said, his name sounding like a threat even though the man had finally learned to pronounce it right. "Your turn," the senior officer insisted. Pavel wondered how many times he'd been spoken to before responding.

"Your best birthday present, and from whom," Uhura prompted, not quite gently.

He saw the immediate glare from Sulu and dropped the locket. True, he would have been more true to character if he just told them Russians didn't have birthdays.

Sulu would have shot him. Sulu would also be expecting to hear the story of his 14th Name Day again, he mused. Although the kind of memorable story they were looking for, it was not, in truth, the best present he had ever received.

"My father gave me the best present I ever got," he said.

"Well, what was it?" McCoy growled in demand as the Navigator stood to leave.

Chekov smiled softly, his dark eyes shining from an unknown depth.

"It was Eternity."


End file.
